54 cards · four worlds · one alternative universe

Magister Cards

A collectible art card deck that opens a gateway into an alternative mythology where alchemy, history, and modernity intertwine. Each card is a fragment of a world, revealing new meanings through play and interpretation.

Michael and the Chameleon

Michael and the Chameleon

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Descend

These are not playing cards. They are artifacts — each one carries a world. Some worlds take time.

From the authors' notes

The Deck's Mythology

Four worlds in fifty-four faces

Magister is a full 54-card art deck. Suits are not decorative trim — each one is a realm with its own laws, cast, and symbolism. Ranks and houses are woven into the painting itself: you read the card by looking, not by corner indices.

Hearts — Olympian gods — Ann and Scarab

Ann and Scarab

Hearts — Olympian gods

The classical pantheon in motion: desire, metamorphosis, oracle and flame. Hearts carry mythic episodes where mortals and immortals negotiate fate.

Diamonds — Bearers of secrets

Diamonds — Bearers of secrets

Alchemical emissaries, hidden orders, and whispers behind crowns. Diamonds track those who traffic in knowledge that should not travel in plain sight.

Clubs — Knights Templar — Templar's Hunt

Templar's Hunt

Clubs — Knights Templar

Crusade steel, lost treasure-maps, and the long shadow of the order. Clubs anchor the deck in medieval intrigue and the arc from devotion to legend.

Spades — Celebrities & icons — Michael and the Chameleon

Michael and the Chameleon

Spades — Celebrities & icons

Modern myth-making: faces the world thought it knew, reframed as archetypes. Spades ask what happens when public masks become permanent emblems.

Every illustration is a small narrative — portrait, emblem, and historical echo at once. Text on the site expands the frame; the cardboard remains the primary grimoire.

Authors

Two obsessions, one deck

Magister Cards is the work of Magister — Alexander Zhilchik — and Dr.Klein, Vasil Pochitsky's artistic pseudonym.

Magister · Alexander Zhilchik

Creator of the characters and the deck's mythos: businessman, philosopher, philanthropist — and, in his own way, a mystical figure.

Dr.Klein · Vasil Pochitsky

Painter and illustrator. Dr.Klein is how Pochitsky signs this body of work — the hand behind all fifty-four images.

Arthive profile

The deck

Research, paint, play

Two years from the first brief to the finished edition — every card earned its place as a painting before it became cardboard.

Magister locked the cast, conflicts, and four suits as living worlds; Dr.Klein built each image on archives, emblem books, and alchemical reference — research long before pigment hit the panel.

Sketches were not disposable thumbnails: every study was pushed toward a finished easel piece — composition, light, and surface treated as standalone art. Only then was the work adapted to the scale and rhythm of a playing card.

The result is a deck you can frame or deal: museum-grade patience, table-ready rules — research, paint, play in one object.

Play & Ritual

Games of the Deck

Play I

The Procession

A trick-taking game for two to five players. The figures are ranked not by number but by the weight of what they carry. The rules are simple. The logic is not.

Players: 2 – 5 · Duration: 40 – 90 min

Play II

The Market of Wonders

Trade and bluff with the figures of the deck. Each figure has a price; each price is a negotiation; each negotiation is a small lie told politely.

Players: 3 – 6 · Duration: 30 – 60 min

Play III

The Oracle's Method

A solo practice. Lay out the figures in silence. Study their burdens. Ask your question. The cards do not answer — but something shifts.

Players: 1 · Duration: As long as needed

Play IV

The Duel

The classic duel. Fast, tense, played in silence. Know when your figure can be matched. Know when to walk away. Walking away is sometimes the only move.

Players: 2 · Duration: 15 – 30 min

The Complete Deck

Acquire your edition

Limited edition · 500 copies

A numbered collector's set: the art deck, the decoder, the grimoire — sealed in suede.

What's in the set

  • 54 art cards — the playable Magister deck
  • Companion deck — decodings & short card descriptions
  • Grimoire — worlds & full card lore
  • Suede-wrapped collector's box

Free shipping — United States & EU

Other regions: rates shown at checkout.

€ 80

VAT included · limited to 500 numbered copies

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Carefully packed. Each set is hand-numbered.